NORRISTOWN — For the past 18 years a lithe black creature named Cali awed visitors to the Elmwood Park Zoo with her sleek dark fur and penetrating gaze. Wednesday morning, the zoo announced that after more than a year of chemotherapy to battle lymphoma, Cali, a jaguar, experienced a substantial decline in health, which led zoo officials to make the decision to euthanize the big cat.

“It wasn’t unexpected with her age and the cancer she has been dealing with. It was something that everyone was prepared for,” said Dave Wood, curator at the Elmwood Park Zoo.

Wood said that the zoo had been doing everything in its power to keep Cali’s quality of life as comfortable as possible as the cancer progressed. Big cats are expected to reach their late teens or early 20s when in captivity, which is about five years longer than can be expected in the wild.

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“It was a real challenge. The staff really invested the time to get her the care she needed,” Wood said, adding that a veterinary oncologist was brought in to aid the zoo’s care staff. “But yesterday it was determined it was time.”

According to a press release from the zoo, Cali, whose black coat was caused by an excess of the pigment melanin, was named after the Hindu Goddess Kali, and her name means “the black one.”

Cali came to the zoo in 1996 from Marion Nature Park in Ocala, Fla., where she was born on Sept. 19, 1995.

Cali shared an enclosure with Anasazi, the zoo’s spotted male jaguar. The zoo originally planned to breed the pair, but there was a lack of information regarding Anasazi’s lineage. Anasazi passed away in the spring of 2013 at the age of 19 due to complications resulting from kidney failure.

“A lot of zoo volunteers were very upset, because they worked with Cali when she was a cub. There was a long-standing relationship with Cali, particularly the volunteers,” Wood said. “Some of our volunteers have been associated with the zoo for 20 years and worked with Cali when she was a baby so its hitting them pretty hard.”

The pair, part of the zoo’s most popular exhibit, were iconic to the zoo. The zoo’s logo and letterheads all bear the image of a jaguar.

Wood said the zoo, being aware of the age of the jaguars and their exhibit, had already begun preparing to construct a new exhibit that will feature southwestern American animals. The zoo has met with designers and architects who specialize in animal enclosures to design the exhibit, which will feature an area dedicated solely to jaguars.

“People always think of them as the exotic jungle animal, but jaguars occur in an important role in southwest America,” Wood said, adding that the animal has made a comeback in Arizona in particular.

Additionally the new exhibit will feature new enclosures for all of the otters, porcupines and other southwester animals currently at the zoo. The zoo also has plans to bring the ocelot and the jaguarondi to the exhibit.

The zoo is in the fundraising portion of the capital campaign. For more information on the capital campaign, the zoo encourages the public to visit the “Support Us” section at www.elmwoodparkzoo.org.